You guys are irrististable I have tried to ignore you but now I have to give in...and with give in I do not mean that I'll write a TR, but that I am posting here!

Anne-Marie, this is going to cost you (you clever witch)

Now you tell me, how am I going to write a trip report if I did not see anything (almost); it will be all concentrated on squirrels....is that what you want? Do you realize what it means to write a TR when Caracal has one going and Lionspoon is going to write one in a month's time? I don't even know how to take a proper photo, all my bird photos are grained and shaken and I did not fall in love with KTP even if I must admit that it has something fascinating about it. Twee rivieren was a bore, the bunglow in Nossob was horrible.... but of course I can always swift to Addo and Storms River Mouth.

As I have a bad feeling that you will not leave me alone (and I still love you all, strangely enough ) I will see what I can do. No promises though, because I am against breaking promises, and I do not want to start just now to break one.

Proloque: As repeatedly stated, I had no intention to write a Trip Report, but as I am feeling immensely flattered by all this attention I have had to change my mind. May some higher forces sustain both you and me

-4° on the 14th of December 2010 Let us (Fa e Mi) get out of here i.e. Lugano, Switzerland!!

From Milano via Cairo we arrived at Joburg with luggage and all. Fa flew out of the first door he saw for a sigarette while Mi went to get the modem for the netbook and a SIM card for the mobile phone at the MTN office. The modem was ready and loaded with 2GB of internet, but the paper work was not Finally I could concentrate on the essential: Find Elzet, Theuns and Lil’one Do you know how many people are gathered in the arrival hall at O.P. Tambo? THE TELEPHONE of course!!!And there they were those three wonderful persons that I had been looking so much forward to meet They picked us up, took us sightseeing, cooked for us. Theuns taught Fa how to braai they even ordered a real thunderstorm, a BIG one, to make easier the passage from winter to summer. They were unique

Being in Pretoria on the 16th of dec. a bright idea ripened... Why not go to Kgalagadi like this?...there were noavailable. Eish!!! Did the voortrekker have the same problem

After two lovely days, rain and all we left for Upington hoping for some summer.

Small airports are great the car hire formalities were done in 5 minutes, everything was ready only photocopies of licences to be done.Our Nissan X-trail was fine even if it had the steering wheel on the wrong side, but that is only a minor problem together with the gearshift. Taken at TR.

Straight to Pick’n Pay and what a Pick ‘n Pay!!! At the butcher’s I ordered meat to be vacuum packed, deepfrozen and to be picked up three days later when coming back from Augrabies. When I asked a lady about some prices she called right away one of the staff and put her to our disposal during the whole shopping round The whole staff was kind and helpfull, the shop was well stored and clean and orderly. It was a pleasure to shop there. I cannot say the same of the Pick ‘n Pay in Franschhoek

Do you want to hear about National Parks, camps and animals and see some pics too? Later

Outside the shop we had a coffee, guess with who? Yes, Lion Queen and Picnic! We met them again at Twee Rivieren when they brought leopard cub to KTP where she had got a holiday job. Great meeting you!

Augrabies Falls National Park 17th – 19th dec. 2010

What do you do at Augrabies once you have seen

(Not exactly like they were 10 days ago) ??

Yes, we did the trail. We walked from the bungalow to the start, but after 20 meters...: “Did you take the water Fa?” “ No I thought you had taken it Mi” *sigh* back to the bungalow to get the water and take the car to get back to the start. It still was not very warm and there was a nice breeze. If only we had known......

Some pics from the first part of the trail, from the second part there are none..

Pale-winged starling

At this point after a couple of hours and not many difficulties, we had to climb up and down the rocks, “jumbing” ( sit down on you behind, try if you can reach the next stone with one foot and find a sustain for one hand and slowly moving the other leg ahead getting a hold with the other hand, then slowly lifting the first foot resting in balance on three limps while deciding how to proceed) from one stone to the other passing small and not so small water streams. The views and the nature were great, but the breath started suffering.

The trail was not signposted too well either. Reaching a lovely tree with lots of shadow underneath we both collapsed........on top of a “carpet” of OUCH!!!! spines. It could have been worse, only a couple had penetrated and the big ones were in the soles of the shoes. Stupid europeans in Africa a lot of trees have spines!

After a rest we reached a kind of road which was flooded and very, very slippery. My legs were kind of made of jelly at this point. “Stop Fa” I yelled “ a car is arriving, I am going to ask for a lift”. Nice big 4x4 arrived, slowed down seeing the road was flooded and maybe they also saw my left thumb making inviting movements in the direction of the camp. Whoever you are, you saved our lives that day one km. ca. from the camp, thank you

There is a story that goes with the non blurred starling pic. I use a "bridge" camera with a x20 zoom and Fa walks around with a tiny "point and shoot" in his shirt pocket. Fa knowing close to nothing about birds, but liking the looks and colours and this starling sitting on the rock with the sun shining on the feathers looked so nice and Fa pointed and shot " Damn, it just flew off when I clicked"

... And the next morning the rain came down in torrents. And our loos started to rise... and rise... so we gave M&F instructions not to flush theirs... Eisch...

Yet, this was not the end. Things happen in threes, or so they say. Fa isn't into dogs, but he soon made friends with our two K-9s. However, on the last evening, our blind labrador decided that Fa was an intruder, and made it known to Fa...

So I think it was a relieved M&F that got dropped off at the airport the next morn'...

“Life is too short to wake up with regrets. So love the people who treat you right. Forget about those who don’t.” - Harvey MacKay

Please calm down everybody, Elzet included (BTW, How the heck did you manage to log on?) All those expectations make me afraid .

At least Elzet is giving me a hand now It might raise the level..........of the laughter and don't tell lies, I was crying having to go away after only two days of rain...sorry stay We had such a great time and so little time, especially with you and the Oom sleeping in the afternoon

we stayed in bungalow n. 1 Next door on one side we had 4 rather noisy people drinking sundowners, but who luckily went to the restaurant for dinner. On the other side we had a whole colony of they are much smaller than I immagined. I thought they were bigger than the tree squirrels and that shows how the zoom and big lenses change the reality. Things are never what they look like in a trip report. One thing is to see the reality with your eyes another completely different is to see the photos.Anyway I still love the small critters. I could have watched them for hours..and almost did

A short afternoon drive gave us three birds in our “game bag” Northern black korhaan

and when I say that this is a pale chanting goshawk, you’ll have to belive me on my word

Furthermore this very rare sighting of “The famous Grouse”

At Twee Rivieren Fa made his first braai. For this first experiment I thought it better to choose the sausage; it is difficult to ruin completely Surprise! The worst was excellent, only slightly burnt on one side you need a lot of patience to wait until the wood has burned down to the ideal point for cooking. Just ask Fa! (Why did I not take a pic of our first self made braai ). This was the beginning of a love story between Fa and braaing. During the whole trip he nosed around spying on everybody who was braaing. Fa: “Did you know Mi, that there are lots of ways to start a braai?” or after a while. “ No good he is trying to save on wood and firelighters”.

Getting up before the devil has got his shoes on, has never been one of my favourites, but “It's the early bird that catches the worm” my head sung ♪♫ Meeting point was the old reception at 5:30 for a morning walk.

The truck, Jannie, David ( I think) and leopard cub were already there, so we hopped on board in the pitch dark full of expectations. When we started driving we realised how cold it was...the three of us behind were freezing Let it be a lesson!!

To be truthful, I had no idea where we were heading, but after 15 min. We stopped and got off the truck. I was very impressed by the way our two guides prepared their rifles setting them on: ready to fire

The sky started to light up a little and I could not wait for the sun to rise in order to warm up. Jannie stopped and pointed to a fresh and said that it was so fresh that the lion had probably already seen us and had hidden. I wanted to go and look for it, but considered that Jannie probably knew better. We started climbing the dune

towards the desirable sun in a gorgeous light

Finally the sun showed itself

Oh what a blessing for the soul and above all for the body

Our first sighting, apart from the sun, was an elderly springbok lady

probably fallen down from a tree after a discussion with a leopard and shortly after her husband

Great sightings

Jannie passed me his binocolars telling me to look at the cape foxes “up there”. Mi: “where?” Jannie: "up there”......... Not even an elephant would have been visible at that distance

By chance I saw jannie’s post on the forum the next day: “ Lion spoor, cape foxes and general game”.

Sorry everybody, I know that you want to laugh and that’s what I prefer too, but there are some things that I do not want to make humorous even if it would not be difficult at all. One of those things is the state of the accommodations in the parks. I do not mind the simple things with a minimum of modern facilities, when the ones that there are, are working, not broken or dirty, but what I find hard to accept is the squalor.

Most of the times we arrive at a new camp tired only wanting to unpack in a hurry, get the braai going and relax with a glass of something, but more often than not there are things that are not in order or missing or dirty or what do I know (actually I do know) and it irritates me immensely and ruins my mostly good mood.

First of all I hate the squalor, that you find in many accommodations in Sanparks. The lack of repair of things that I would be able to fix with a screwdriver, some glue, a couple of nails and a hammer, a layer of paint or simply a replacement of minor or no cost at all. The lack of hangers in a wardrobe. The lack of a shelf in the bathroom where to put your toiletries. The lack of hooks in the bathroom for the towels, that are nicely laid out on the beds ( or are you expected to put them back on the bed after use nicely humid?) . The lack of a waste basket in the bathroom. The dustbin in the kitchen without a lid or a broken one etc. etc. etc. This is only a list that fits mostly.

Apart from all the above + 4 or 5 individual shortcomings for this bungalow only , when we entered there were no table nor chairs in the kitchen Down to reception ( I tried to get another bungalow, but they said that the camp was fully booked) to ask for the missing furniture. I did not hear a: “ We are sorry” or similar, but a laconic “I’ll send someone”. The “someone” x 2 arrived rather quickly with a table and two chairs THE ONES FOR OUTSIDE that seem to be made of cast iron and are enormous and very, very heavy. They have probably taken them from outside the twin bungalow.. Better than nothing.... In the evening of the next day “someone” returned and told that they needed the furniture, they had brought the day before..........I am sure that you can imagine what kind of an answer “someone” got.

This is the kind of things that are not acceptable, not only the missing equipment, but the whole attitude and total lack of understanding of things seen for the guests’ point of view.

You cannot expect that the persons who clean the units are able to understand our needs and the way that a bungalow should be presented. A supervisor with at least some experience in the tourist industry should control not only the units, but also reception and the whole camp. If not daily at least once a week. How many times have you found a lamp that does not work? ....and that is the absolute minimum lack I can think of.

Yes, I have sent a complaint to pile up with all the others!!!

Now that I have got this off my chest, the next instalment will be more in tune with the former ones and please excuse me for my outburst, but these are things that are unacceptable and very much underestimated by Sanparks.